This first of several HOLIDAYS ISSUE mix tapes is a wild, flotsam-and-jetsam, fruits-of-the-sea assortment of sailors and sea-shanties, Belle & Sebastian and British Sea Power, Händelian hornpipes and Frank Ocean. It's like a confused but energetic surf, the point of a beach where two opposing currents collide: in other words, it's a real mix.
A real mix that, if I'm being honest, might best be served up analog, playing from the dashboard of your hot car as you drive down to see someone for lobster rolls and a breakup. For when your brain is skipping sideways between non-adjoining lyrics, interrupted by the thrash of wind from your window, and then later as you walk down to the beach, with sand prickling your ankles. As you eye past this person, who you know pretty well, whose life you anticipate rolling slowly away from yours like the surf you spy out there; distracted by a mouth full of lobster, your brain humming Sea of Love on repeat like the broken record you are, your legs already feeling the elation of diving into salted and redemptive waters.
Follow MIXTAPE #3: THE SEA on Spotify HERE and, as usual, a motley assortment of YouTube links below the Spotify player (with some changes).
xoxo, Lydia
Listen to more Olympia Monthly mix tapes HERE